Malli wrote:Its also my feeling in cases where the animal is acting "high" or narcotized, that it's not necessarily that the medication isn't doing what its supposed to but the dose may be a little off - often a decrease in dose even by 1/4 will take away the odd behavior and looks.

I think this is a good point. I would say more than 90% of the tripawds who have an issue with tramadol, do back off the dosage a bit and continue to use it for the length of time prescribed, which is generally 10 - 14 days.

We used tramadol with Doogie for about 3 days after his surgery and the first day he did see pink elephants, but after that he tolerated it well. He was on tramadol, rimadyl and amoxi...I always split them up so they were given at different times during the day and always tried to make sure they were given with food.

I'm a little late to the discussion , but I will say that I have more problems with Clavamox causing an upset stomach than I do with Tramadol. What I sometimes recommend is giving a dose of pepcid, wait an hour, feed, wait another 30 minutes, and then give the medication.